


Bedtime Stories

by Bonnie_Bug



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-25
Updated: 2012-11-25
Packaged: 2018-08-17 10:11:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,984
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8140207
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bonnie_Bug/pseuds/Bonnie_Bug
Summary: Once upon a time, because, as you know, every good story starts with once upon a time, there was an impossible man, who traveled around in a magic blue box.





	

Hmm? What is it, child? Shouldn’t you be in bed by now?  
  
Ahh… Can’t sleep, can you? Yes, I recognize that restless look in your eyes. Goodness knows I’ve seen it far too often staring back at me from the mirror. Good thing I know _just_ the solution for insatiable minds.  
  
It means hungry, without ever being able to feel full. Now, come up next to your Grandmother, love, there’s more than enough room for the both of us on this old couch. Tuck your blanket in a little tighter, dear, for there’s a chill in the air tonight. There’s a good lass.  
  
Now, what story shall I tell you tonight? Do you want to hear about Cinderella and the ball? About Sleeping Beauty and the prince who kissed her awake? Or perhaps–  
  
… Ahh. You know, I had a feeling you’d be asking for that story tonight…  
  
  
  
Once upon a time, because, as you know, _every_ good story starts with once upon a time, there was an impossible man, who traveled around in a magic blue box.  
  
Yes, a big, old, blue Police Box, just like in your Grandda’s paintings.  
  
It was a big wooden box, and the bluest blue you could ever imagine. Picture the strongest blue you can imagine, like a summer sky at noon, directly above your head, and strengthen it by about twenty shades. You _just might_ be close to that shade of blue. Just might.  
  
Now, this man, he was the kindest and most caring man imaginable, and he lived to help others. He was a very good man, the best man you could ever know in a thousand years, even if he himself didn’t believe it to be so. He traveled around in his magic box, through all of space and time, dropping down and popping in whenever it looked like you needed help. And one day, a little blue planet needed just his own special brand of help.  
  
There was a lot of fighting going on, on that little blue ball of dust and rock, and a lot of people were hurt. A _lot_ of people.  
  
… Yes, nice people were hurt.  
  
… Yes, a lot of bad people were hurt, as well, but for now, let’s all call them just _people_ , because that’s what the impossible man helps you to see. There’s no “good” people, or “bad” people. Just… people. People shaped by different decisions and scenarios, but people nonetheless.  
  
Hmm? Oh, it’s… it’s like the outline for one of your plays. It’s a bunch of different happenings grouped in a timely order. Do you understand? Good. Now, where was I…? Ah, yes, that’s right.  
  
A lot of people were hurt in this fighting, until one day, the impossible man came down from the sky in his magic blue box. Well, I say he came down from the sky… It’s really the only logical place for him to have come from. But no, his mad blue box really just sort of… faded in. Like it had always been sitting on that street corner, and it was only just now that you noticed it was there.  
  
Oh, I’ll never forget that noise as it faded in… That beautiful, wonderful, impossible noise. I was very young, then, not much older than you are, dear, but I still remember it, clear as day. It was the sound of the universe, it was. The sound of the universe _breathing_. It was like magic, wonder, and hope all rolled up into one glorious sound…  
  
… Hmm? Oh, I’m sorry, dear, I faded out, didn’t I? I’m so sorry… Where was I, again?  
  
That’s right, the impossible man appearing. Thank you, love.  
  
Now, like I said, there was an _awful_ lot of fighting going on. However, when that man stepped out of his big blue box, everyone just… _stopped_. He didn’t say a word, didn’t raise a hand, he just sort of… _stood_ there… almost like he was waiting for something. The fighting slowed down, until only one or two people were still fighting, and even then they were quickly hushed by their fellows. Then… the man _talked_.  
  
I don’t remember half of the things he said, but let me tell you, if there was anybody left out on the field that day who even had half an inkling to keep on fighting, it was squashed flat faster than you could say “Please and thank you.” I _do_ remember, though, standing there at his feet, and looking up into all that power and magic. His eyes were like fire, and he glared and stared at everyone so sharply, I half expected diamond daggers to come flying out of his eyes. He was frightening, unbelievably frightening… but for some reason, I couldn’t make myself feel scared.  
  
I was only a little girl, mind, but I could already tell this was a man we could trust. Oh, he looked so angry and fierce at that moment, but I could tell, deep down and hidden away, there was an overwhelming amount of kindness in him. The man stopped all of the fighting with some simple words and a stare or two, for Pete’s sake! If you can’t trust someone who can still two angry groups of people without harming a soul, then who _can_ you trust?  
  
… That was a rhetorical question, dear.  
  
… It means a question that you weren’t really expecting to be answered. Yes, I know it’s rather silly, isn’t it?  
  
… Yes, that _was_ one of them, yes! Very good, love. Now, where were we?  
  
Ah, yes, thank you.  
  
The impossible man walked up to the two leaders of the people, and brought them close together. He talked quietly with them for a very long while, and when they all stepped back, peace was made. There was going to be no more fighting, not even little squabbles like you and Jeffrey have when you have to split a dessert. It was just like _magic_ , and I could hardly believe it. I _still_ can hardly believe it to this day, to be honest…  
  
I walked up, then, right up next to the impossible man, and tugged on his jacket sleeve. I don’t know what I was going to say, but I wanted to say _something_ to him. To thank him, perhaps, but even my young mind knew a simple “thank you” wasn’t enough. He’d given us our _lives_ back. There’s no way you can thank anyone enough for that.  
  
Either way, he’d looked down at me then, startled, like he hasn’t expected someone so small to be there, especially a little girl like me. And then, he _smiled_.  
  
If he was like fire before, yelling stern words at all of the fighters, he was like starlight now. His entire face just _lit up_ , from his eyes to his teeth, in a way so whole, you’d hardly guess he had ever frowned before in his life, much less mere minutes ago. I’d never seen anyone smile that completely before, and I haven’t seen anyone smile like that since, not even your Grandda, and you _know_ how I love it when he smiles.  
  
He smiled at me, and then he swooped down and picked me up, setting me on his hip like he was my dad, and I’d just come home from school. He asked me for my name, so I told him Laura, Laura Rose, and he smiled even brighter and told me that was a beautiful name. He said he knew a girl once, a girl named Rose, and that she was almost as pretty as I was. I’d just smiled and wrapped my arms around his neck and squeezed him tight, like he really _was_ my Daddy, come home from fighting at last. He laughed and bounced me up and down, and then he grabbed my shoulders and pulled me back so he could look at me, and he asked me if I wanted to see a surprise, if I wanted to see something special.  
  
… What did I do? Well, what do you _think_ I did? I said, “Yes, pretty please! I’d love to see a surprise!” After the miracle he’d performed with stopping all the fighting, I couldn’t wait to see what was up his sleeves now.  
  
He walked me back to his magic blue box, still on his hip, bouncing and skipping and laughing the whole way. He set me down, then, and pulled out a key from his pocket. He stuck it in the latch, and said that his magic box didn’t _just_ fade in and out on street corners – it actually faded in and out on all sorts of places, but that was neither here nor there –  it didn’t _just_ fade in and out like a desert mirage at noon, but that it was _bigger on the inside._  
  
Now, I was just a young thing, then, still bright and new and full of wrong ideas of how the world worked, but I knew, I just _knew_ , that things couldn’t be bigger on the inside than on the outside. And I told him just that. And do you know what he did? He just _smiled_ and _laughed_ and clicked the lock and pushed the door wide open.  
  
“Why don’t you see for yourself?” he asked, and so I skipped right inside. And you know what?  
  
_He was right._  
  
Now, don’t ask me how that is, because no one in the whole wide world knows how it works, certainly not me. Maybe not even the impossible man himself really knows, no matter _how_ much he said otherwise. But the fact remains, it was much, _much_ bigger inside than the outside appeared. And it was magnificent, and wonderful, and utterly, utterly _impossible_.  
  
But that rather fits, though, don’t you think? An impossible box for the impossible man. So many impossibilities, all stacked up on top of one another, squashed against each other like the layers of a cake, and yet, he made it all fit together, and make sense. Of a sort.  
  
He didn’t show me how his impossible box worked, only showed me around a few rooms and then walked me back home, and though I never saw him or his box again, I’ve never forgotten how that wonderful place looked. You remember the paintings I’ve created, right? From back when I could still manage a paintbrush? The paintings of the butterfly-filled garden with two suns, or of the giant clock with its gears all made of intricate gold, or of a big, round room that looks like it came from a science fiction show? Those are all rooms that I saw in that box. Yes, even the one of the night sky with fish swimming about in the air. That room was my favorite.  
  
What do you mean, what about Grandda’s paintings? Ohh… Yes, he met the impossible man as well, though much later in life than when I did. I wasn’t around at the time, I was visiting your Great Auntie Caroline for her wedding, but when I returned, he hardly waited until I was back on solid ground before he poured out the news to me. That was when I knew he was the man I was going to marry, you know, when I saw his eyes sparkle and shine like I knew mine did whenever I spoke about the impossible man – but, that’s an altogether different tale, for another night.  
  
Ohh, no no no, no more stories tonight. It’s past time that young girls went to bed, missie, and I won’t have your mother hounding on me for keeping you up until all hours of the morning. Now, give your Grandmother a kiss… there’s a good girl. Off you trot, now. If you go to bed quick enough, maybe you’ll dream of the impossible man and his magic blue box. Wouldn’t that be grand?

  
  
I love you, too. Goodnight, dear. Goodnight.


End file.
